The digital age we enter is full of promises and new-found dangers. Our brains are given unique possibilities to learn and create everyday. They are also constantly under attack. Rogue companies trick our brain chemicals for profit. Just like fast-food is engineered for elevated levels of sugar and fat, information delivery is engineered to provide dopamine hits. As our brain is dedicated to information processing, we have to be aware of what gets in. In the context of our brain, Brillat-Savarin’s aphorism also rings true: “Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are”.

🔑 We live in a hyper-personalized digital world. The more data you give to companies, the more tailored your experience with their product will be. Is this a fair balance of power? Terence Eden’s doesn’t think so: Personalisation is Asymmetric Psychological Warfare.

🤖 Do you want to have home-made Indian Food at home but are too busy to even take time to cook? The MechanicalChef is here for you! Not for me though, I love cooking. The video is impressive and hilarious at the same time. We’re far away from kitchen automation.

👨‍💻 What if you had your own open-source self-hosted version of IFTTT? That’s what Huginn wants to be. It’s still a bit rough on the UX side, but has great features and a promising future!

🔑 This post from Paul Graham about cities and ambition raise good points about how a city’s dominant culture influences its economic power. According to him, Paris is style-focused, NYC is money-focused, and Silicon Valley is… power-focused. Surprising, heh?

🎧 This festival in the South of France is now on my watch list. Pointu Festival gives a hell of a line-up, in a dream location, for free.

In case you lived under a rock for the past few weeks, let me break the news for you: a 72 year old man separates children from their parents and locks them up in internment camps. Sometimes it’s really hard not to think this world is completely fucked up. We take borders as granted. But it’s only our current way of organizing us as human that make borders. The question is here: How should we organize ourselves to collectively achieve a higher level of freedom? I think the web was one answer, but is now ultimately working against us. I now hope a greater privacy and decentralization movement will help us in our quest.

3. ❤️ Food is one of the most powerful link between cultures and people. I had the chance to eat at a restaurant participating in the Refugee Food Festival. There might be an edition in your town. And if there isn’t one, you can organize one in your city thanks to their methodology kit.

This week edition is quite small but contains a massive article on Artificial Intelligence. Take your time to read it. The world is changing fast, and it’s only the beginning! People in the future will look at us like we look at the middle-age people.

🔑 Ian Hogarth (creator of Songkick) wrote an essay on AI Nationalism. This is a must read on how AI will shape states and nations. He believe that AI should become a global public good with governance mechanics that reflect the interests of all countries and people.

I am still quite unsure how to introduce these weekly collections of links. What do cyberpunk cat-like whiskers for humans, fablabs, a psychopathic A.I. with disturbing Rorschach tests results, infrared macro photography of cactuses, and most-potent-magic-mushrooms trip reports have in common? You tell me.

👩‍💻 Cyberpunk is not about dark future and noir aesthetic. It can be also be cute and fun!

👨‍💻 Fablabs are at the forefront on how to collect data for citizen action. A key tool for smart city projects. How Barcelona shushed noise-makers with sensors. While the finality of the project might be questionnable, it is still remarkable how data can be used by citizens for a change.

📸 I published a series on anger. They are all analog photographies, without any editing.

🔑 An interesting idea and point of view by Paul Stamets: “Plants and mushrooms have intelligence, and they want us to take care of the environment, and so they communicate that to us in a way we can understand.” Why us? “We humans are the most populous bipedal organisms walking around, so some plants and fungi are especially interested in enlisting our support. Michael Pollan on what it’s like to trip on the most potent magic mushroom.

📸 Suprachromacy is a project by Marcus Wendt who used infrared macro photography of cacti to create images questioning our own sense of perception.

I finally picked a name for this section on the blog. I was never satisfied with the “Links Worth Sharing” name. It was a bit too cold. I haven’t settled for a language as well. I’d like to write in French but I want as well to reach a global audience. I read mostly articles in English, so I’m not sure it makes sense to write French here.

I picked the name “Nebula”. The latin for “fog” or “cloud”. It’s also in reference of the Interstellar Cloud which can give birth to stars. As I’m more and more drawn into astronomy, I think it suits well. This section is an unorganized collection of links, which feeds my mind with inspiration.